We all know that children (and adults, too!) need to eat more fruits and vegetables. But as a mother of a 2- and 4-year-old,I know getting children to eat a wide variety of produce (especially vegetables) isn't always easy. In previous blogs we've discussed how modeling health eating and even renaming vegetables (x-ray vision carrots and power peas) may increase kids' intake of healthy foods. A study out of London recently suggests a new strategy: give children a small non-food reward for taking a tiny taste.¹

In this study, families with children aged 3-4 years were randomly assigned to one of three groups: exposure to disliked vegetable plus tangible reward (sticker); exposure to disliked vegetable plus social reward (praise); or no treatment control condition. In the intervention groups, parents offered their children 12 daily tastes of the vegetable, giving either praise or a sticker for tasting. No specific advice was given to the control group. Assessments of intake and liking of the target (disliked) vegetable were conducted by researchers immediately after the intervention period and 1 and 3 months later.

Results showed that the children who received exposure to disliked vegetable plus tangible reward (sticker) increased their intake and liking of their target (disliked) vegetable significantly more than did children in the control group. Further, these differences were maintained at the 3-month follow-up. Increases and liking of in the exposure to disliked vegetable plus social reward (praise) group were not significantly different from the control group.

Thus, the researchers concluded that parental use of tangible rewards (like stickers) along with repeated taste exposures to disliked foods may improve children's diets. While some argue that rewards don't work, and actually backfire in the long term, these researchers say that that evidence depends on initial liking of the food. Declines in intake and liking for initially well-liked foods have been observed in previous studies when rewards were given but here the children were rewarded only for consuming nonpreferred vegetables.

Worth a try?!? Implement a "Tiny Tastes" program in your household (repeated exposures to a disliked vegetable followed by a small reward like a sticker) and let us know how it goes. Afterall, research shows that it takes multiple taste exposures (8 to 10) for many kids to accept a previously rejected or unfamiliar food.  

¹Remington, A., Anez, E., & Cro, H. (2011). Increasing food acceptance in the home setting: a randomized controlled trial of parent-administered taste exposure with random incentives. Am J Clin Nutr, doi: 10.3945/ajcn.111.024596.